Please turn with me tonight to Isaiah 58. Isaiah chapter 58. We read together the text for our consideration being verses 13 and 14, the last two verses of Isaiah chapter 58. Once you have found that, we read that together in connection with our consideration tonight of the fourth commandment. And therefore, I ask that you also turn in the back of the Psalter hymnal to page 52. Page 52. Once you have found that, we will first profess together what we believe as summarized in the Catechism. Lord's Day 38, Question and Answer 103, page 52. There we are asked, what is God's will for us in the fourth commandment? First, that the gospel ministry and education for it be maintained and that especially on the festive day of rest, I regularly attend the assembly of God's people to learn what God's Word teaches, to participate in the sacraments, to pray to God publicly and to bring Christian offerings for the poor. Second, that every day of my life I rest from my evil ways. Let the Lord work in me through His Spirit and so begin already in this life the eternal Sabbath. Isaiah chapter 58 Shout it aloud, do not hold back, raise your voice like a trumpet, Declare to my people their rebellion and to the house of Jacob their sins. For day after day they seek me out. They seem eager to know my ways as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not forsaken the commands of its God. They ask me for just decisions and seem eager for God to come near them. Why have we fasted, they say, and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves and you have not noticed? Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers. Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high. Is this the kind of fast I have chosen? Only a day for a man to humble himself? Is it only for bowing one's head like a reed and for lying on sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call a fast? A day acceptable to the Lord? Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen? To loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke? To set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter? When you see the naked to clothe him? And not to turn away from your own flesh and blood? Then your light will break forth like the dawn and your healing will quickly appear. Then your righteousness will go before you and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard. Then you will call and the Lord will answer. You will cry for help and He will say, Here am I. If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with a pointing finger and malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness and your night will become like the noonday. The Lord will guide you always. He will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations. You will be called repairer of broken walls, restorer of streets with dwellings. Now the words of our text, If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath, have from doing as you please on my holy day, If you call the Sabbath a delight and the Lord's holy day honorable, and if you honor it by not going your own way and not doing as you please or speaking idle words, then you will find your joy in the Lord, and I will cause you to ride on the heights of the land and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob. The mouth of the Lord has spoken. Once again, we know the fourth commandment says this as the catechism records it from Exodus chapter 20. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. In it you shall not do any work. You or your son or your daughter, your manservant or your maidservant, or your cattle or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. So, Pastor, it's Sunday. May I do this? Should I do that? Is it wrong to go here or there? Is it okay to watch this or that on television? Would it be a sin to do? You see, beloved in Christ, we have all asked these questions. I've struggled with these questions right alongside of many of you. And I suspect that there are many preachers that struggle, as I do, with preaching, with preparing a sermon and preaching on the fourth commandment. Largely because it brings so many arguments. Because it seems like the people in the church, you, me, and in ages past and no doubt in ages to come, the people want a list of do's and don'ts. Give us a list of what we may do and what we should not do on the Lord's Day. But the problem is if there was ever a minister who tried to give his congregation a list of do's and don'ts, it would only turn into arguments because of things on that list that would strike the people in a wrong way. Well, these things are okay. These things have been a part of our family tradition for years. Well, these things, we have determined they're not wrong. And to try to come up with a list of do's and don'ts, beloved, does nothing more than make Sunday a burden. It makes it a no-win situation. And that's because we tend to look at things, activities on the Lord's Day, from the perspective of the world. And the activities of the world. And therefore, the things that we don't get to do on Sunday like the world. But you see, beloved, we must look at this day from God's perspective. What He lays before us. What He says we get to do. You see, for Christians, for the church, Sunday is not just another day of the week. We've made it another day of the week. We've even made it a part of the weekend. No doubt some of you will return to work tomorrow and maybe somebody will say to you or you might say to one of your co-workers, Well, what did you do over the weekend? And included in that, of course, is meant Sunday. We have turned it into a day of convenience. A day to get things out of the way or done that we weren't able to get to the rest of the week. We've made it just another vacation day, a travel day, so that we don't have to take an extra day off of work. Boys and girls, we hear on TV, at least I do once in a while lately, that Sunday night is football night. No, it's not. You see, beloved, it's the Lord's day. It is His day. And not just from 9.30 to 10.30 in the morning, not just from 6 to 7 at night, but the entire day is His day and it is His gift to His people. It is His gift to distinguish, for example, so many years ago, Israel in the Promised Land from the heathen nations that surrounded her. To distinguish the Jews in captivity from her captors and the worshipers of false gods. And even today, to distinguish Christians, God's people, from the godless society and the world in which we live. It is the Lord's day, and as His day, it is His gift for you and me to delight in. And through Isaiah, the Lord instructs us how to delight in the Lord's day. We are called to delight in the Lord's Day. First of all, doing God's will. And secondly, enjoying God's blessing. First of all, doing God's will on His holy day. In the text, Isaiah calls it the Lord's holy day. And notice how he begins, verse 13, If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath and from doing as you please on My holy day. If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath. The way Isaiah says it here, it's as if he is saying that the Lord's holy day is as holy ground. The idea of feet here has the idea of the business of life, the path of life, and walking that path of life. And the Sabbath, therefore, Isaiah is saying in a sense, is the place upon which one walks. And the question then is, what is your path of life on the Sabbath? What is the path that you follow on the Sabbath? And clearly the Word of the Lord here through Isaiah calls us to keep from walking according to our own ways. To keep from walking as we please on the holy ground of the Lord's holy day. Because to walk according to our own way on the Lord's holy day is to violate what He made to be holy. It is to make it unholy. It is His holy day, a day set aside by Him. Of course, there are so many, even in the evangelical world today, who say that in Christ there is no more literal day that's needed. It's gone. We don't have to worry about that. because we rest in Him in all of life in anticipation of the eternal rest and glory to come. And we don't disagree with that, that we are to rest in Him all the days of our life in anticipation of the glory of heaven. And I trust that all of us here tonight also do not believe that God has set aside that there's no more need of a day. If you did, you probably wouldn't be here. Nowhere in Scripture has God put away the literal day. Not even in the New Testament. There's been a change. In the Old Testament, we know the Sabbath was the seventh day of the week. The last day of the week. That was the day which God's people were to rest from the journey of the week, as it were. That day, that last day, put an end every single week to the ordinary work of the people in which they were called to turn in a particular way. To turn away from the influence of the world that they were surrounded by all week long. To turn away from tending to fix their eyes on outward things and instead to turn their mind and their heart on God and His Word. And we know this is serious business. God meant what He said. In Numbers chapter 15, you can read there about the man who was caught gathering wood on the Sabbath. And just like with the son last week that we considered in Leviticus 24 who blasphemed the name of the Lord with a curse, the people really didn't know what to do, so they waited for the word of the Lord. And in the very same way as the one who blasphemed the name of the Lord, God said in this case with regard to the man caught gathering wood on the Sabbath, that the congregation was to take him outside the camp and stone him. Put him to death. God meant what He said. He takes His day seriously. And boys and girls, you remember that when the Israelites were in the wilderness, for all those years and God provided manna every single day, right? Except for one. On the seventh day. They were to take enough on the sixth day for both the sixth day and the seventh day. They were to prepare on the sixth day for the seventh day. Just like you and I are called to prepare mentally, physically, spiritually for the Lord's Day. But of course, we know that the New Testament Sabbath has been changed to the first day of the week with good reason. That is the day that our Lord Jesus Christ rose from the dead when His victory was seen for what it is by His people. That is the day in which we read over and over again in the epistles that the church gathered together for worship and the breaking of bread together. And that is the day that John in Revelation 1 verse 10 calls the Lord's day. The first day of the week. The day of rest. In which God gives strength, as it were, for the journey to come, the work of the week to come. In Moses' giving of the law, in both those places we see that he says a day has been established by two unchangeable truths, creation and redemption. In Exodus 20, verse 11, in connection with giving that fourth commandment, he gives this reason. For in six days, the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them. But He rested on the seventh day. And that was the pattern that God gave to His people. That on the seventh day, they were to rest from their work of the week. And in Deuteronomy 5, verse 12, when giving the fourth commandment, He gives this reason. Remember that you were slaves in Egypt, and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. He points to redemption. God's people were to rest on the seventh day and they were to observe that day by rejoicing in the One from whom redemption came. They were to rejoice in the One who set them apart from the rest of the sinful world on that day. They were to observe that day by removing their focus from the world on the Lord's holy day. And therefore, the day was to be honored for Him. How were they to honor it? By doing God's will. And God's will includes, as our text says, calling the Sabbath a delight. Calling it a delight. Calling it pleasant. And that delight, first of all, has reference to God. What pleases Him? What is delightful to Him? And nothing is more pleasing or acceptable or delightful to God than His people doing His will in treating His day as holy, as set apart for Him. Not set apart for our own selfish purposes and interests. His day is to be honored through sincere worship. You see, that's the reason for Isaiah's rebuke here that the Lord calls him to rebuke the people because their worship was insincere. It was not sincere. The Lord calls Isaiah in verse 1, Shout it aloud, do not hold back, raise your voice like a trumpet, Declare to My people their rebellion and to the house of Jacob their sins. Notice that God commands His preachers to look His people in the eye and confront them with their sin. That's what He tells Isaiah to do. And here, to confront them with their false worship. Oh, they were worshiping. They were fasting. They were observing the ceremonial laws. But their worship on God's holy day was false worship. It was not insincerity. It was not in truth. It was not from the heart. They honored God with their lips, but again, their heart was far from Him. In verse 2, we're clearly told that their worship was hypocritical. That they came before God thinking that they were a righteous people, but we're told in that verse that God was insulted. He was insulted. And then in verse 3, we're told that the people were ignorant about it. Why have we fasted, they say, and you have not seen it? Why have we humbled ourselves? And you have not noticed. You see, the people were disappointed in God. They had outwardly done what God requires. They had done their duty. But it's not about duty, first of all. It's about delight. But they had done what God requires and they were complaining that God did not see them. He didn't check them off for that particular Sabbath day. But the problem is God did see them. He saw everything very clearly and He was not pleased with what He saw. He did not accept their worship. Why? As verse 3 continues, Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers. You see, notice there. On the day of your fasting, you do as you please. That insincere worship was evidenced by what they did the rest of the day. They had done what selfishly pleased them. And the bottom line is, as we look at verses 3 through 5, is they had not properly worshipped God. They gave a good show of repentance, but it was not from the heart. And that was evidenced by doing their own will. Honoring God's day includes sincere worship, but also honoring through renouncing our own will. Denying, giving up our own will. Isaiah calls for it to be honored in verse 13 by not going your own way and not doing as you please or speaking idle words. It's not enough to say, yes, that's true. We are to keep the Sabbath day holy. It's not enough to confess it, beloved. The commandments of God, including this one, calls for action. Our own way includes doing what pleased them and not striving to please God. It included doing their own selfish work interests. Notice verse 3 says, You exploit all your workers. You see, they went to worship. But they made their employees work. They did not let them rest as Moses commanded that your manservant and maidservant may rest as well as you do. And not only did they make them work, but they demanded top performance. They wanted the best of both worlds. They wanted to go and worship God and do their duty. And they wanted to enjoy the profit of their own selfish businesses. Now, most of us don't have a problem here. If we own a business, it's closed on Sunday. If we don't, if we work for another, we demand our Sundays off. We do believe that the Bible makes exceptions legitimately for works of mercy, necessity, and ministry. We need to have doctors and nurses available in case there is a medical emergency. We need police officers and firefighters in those cases. Farmers need to feed their animals to keep them going, to keep them alive. We need preachers to preach the Word. But when Isaiah says, you exploit all your workers, I ask you to think about this. Might this also include those who serve you by working for you indirectly? And I'll be honest, I'm talking about restaurants. I'm talking about stores. Or any place else that you and I might be tempted to go, which involves people who are already working. Now, some of you are familiar with Dr. D. James Kennedy from the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. About four or five years ago, early on a Sunday morning, we had the telecast on and heard a few words of his sermon that morning, which was on the Fourth Commandment. And I was struck by what he said regarding this very point, and so I ordered a manuscript of that sermon. He says, When I first came to this area about 40 years ago, we didn't have an evening service. I believe now they do. I had never thought about that problem, and my wife and I went out on Sunday evening to get something to eat. And I recall that one evening we were seated at a counter in a little restaurant. The cook was behind the counter fixing the food we had ordered. We were the only customers there, so I got into a conversation with this man who was about 40. I found out that he was a Christian, at least he professed to be. And I said to him, where do you go to church? He said, well, I don't go to church. So I started to pontificate a little bit and said to him, well, you know, sir, you really ought to go to church. It's actually very important, and why did you stop going? Suddenly, he whirled on me with the instrument in his hand he had been cooking with and said, because of people like you who come in here and make me work all day long to feed you. That's why. And Kennedy goes on to say that never again did they do that. Did they go out to eat on Sunday evening? And he also addressed his congregation and said, well, you know, some of you might say, well, that was that man's choice. He had a choice whether to work or not. And even some of us here might say, well, you know, he's going to be open anyway and therefore we're not working and we can't stop Him anyway. But again, as we said this morning, there is no excuse for sin. And I ask you to think about this. Isn't this like being a silent bystander to taking the Lord's name in vain as we considered last Sunday evening? That those in Leviticus 24, those who had witnessed that man blaspheming the Lord's name with a curse were told to lay their hands on him as a sign that they had no part in it? And the whole congregation was commanded to stone him, to uphold the honor of the Lord's holy name? Isn't it really a little bit the same thing here, that we still participate in treating that day as unholy by causing them to serve us? Again, the man who was caught gathering sticks on wood on the Sabbath was stoned the congregation in that case too was to publicly demonstrate their hatred for that sin that they didn't agree with it that they had no part in it that they upheld God's holy day already 300 years ago Matthew Henry the commentator around 1700 he interprets this passage Isaiah chapter 58 really in what we might call contemporary language language that you and I can understand he interprets going your own way as talking about our callings, our employment in life, and our own pleasure as sports and recreation. We didn't even know they had sports back 300 years ago. But he talks about that being sports and recreation outside of our callings. And he explains our own words to mean our conversations concerning our callings, our employment, or our pleasure. These things that are not wrong in and of themselves, but he says on the Lord's Day, these things all violate the Lord's Day by drawing our hearts and the hearts of others away from God. And whether you agree with this fully or not, I must say that as I have meditated on this, I am gravely in error of violating the Lord's Day in a particular way with many of you. And that is on the Lord's Day. Sometimes when I see you before the service or after the service or at the door, I find myself asking you, well, how was your week? How's your job going? Now, those things have their place, but not at the door. I have no business in that way drawing your attention away from the worship that you and I have just engaged in. And in that way, drawing your hearts away from the Lord. And I'm sorry. And I apologize. And I will strive to not do that again. And if I do, please stop me. Please confront me. Instead, as Matthew Henry says, we are to mind God's ways. We are to make religion the business of the day. We are to choose the things that please God. We are to speak His words. And in all things, we are to strive to put a difference between this day and the other days. A distinction between the Lord's holy day and the other days of the week. And as well, a distinction, a difference between us, between you and the people and the activities of the world on this holy day. On His holy day, beloved. We are to do God's will. To do God's will in worship, that which pleases Him. Worship is to be our element. You know, sometimes we say that someone who loves mechanic work, when they're under the hood of a car, they're in their element. Or someone who enjoys attention and being listened to when they are surrounded by a group and they're speaking and everybody's listening, they're in their element. Well, for you and me as believers, on the Lord's Day in a particular way, worship is to be our element. We are to be in our element. And that's why the Catechism calls us to maintain the Gospel ministry and the education for it. That we might continue to worship God as He pleases to hear His Word proclaimed. To worship God for His majesty, His mighty wonders, and for His redeeming work. but outside worship is still the question, isn't it? Because we don't sit here all day long on Sunday. And I believe Isaiah touches on that too. Verses 6 and 7, Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen, to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter when you see the naked to clothe him and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood. Second part of verse 9 and first part of verse 10, if you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger, a malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed. And I believe we can summarize this by saying outside of corporal worship, God calls us on this day to engage in works of ministry and mercy. And again, there are numerous ways we could talk about that, but just a couple to plant in your mind. For example, visiting. visiting the sick, the hospitals, the lonely, those who are in prison, as Jesus calls for in Matthew 25. At least once a month, there's an invitation in our bulletin to go to the ministry of Valley Vista. Every month, it's there. How many of you have gone? I've only gone once, I'm ashamed to say. There are people there who are near death who probably don't know the Lord. And the opportunity is there to speak the Word of the Lord to them. Or another good way to spend the day, reading. Reading your Bible. Reading edifying spiritual material. Reading those things which God will then use to give you greater knowledge of Him and His Word. In many ways, the Lord's Day should be the busiest day of the week in God's service. That even if we go here or there, maybe not to do the normal things we might do there Monday through Saturday, but to speak the Word of the Lord, to engage people in conversations, to witness to them. You see, more than the other days of the week, we're always to be different, but more than the other days of the week, we are to look different than the world and in everything point to God. And I ask myself this too, How do some TV shows that we watch on the Lord's Day, how are they pleasing to God? And the bottom line is we need to answer they don't, they're not. You see, and the beauty here, beloved, is that in this busiest day of the week in God's service, we don't have to go out and find the time. Because God gives it to us. He hands it to us this day in which we rest from the ordinary days of life. Yet this does also point to the rest of life. We are called to do God's will on every day. The catechism answers says that every day of my life I rest for my evil ways. Let the Lord work in me through His Spirit and so begin already in this life the eternal Sabbath. We are to rejoice in the handiwork of God including the health and the strength and the intellect He has given to us to carry out our employment and to participate in recreation. The one day, we might say, determines the six. The one is set aside particularly to focus on God. and the things of God. And it is then a day of preparation to live before His face, to live before the eyes of a watching world every day. We are called to serve God as redeemed people, as set apart people on Monday through Saturday on those six days on which Moses says, you shall labor and do all your work. Six days God has given to us. Six whole days. It's enough. it is sufficient to get the work done He has given us to do. To make a living, to enjoy our hobbies and recreations, to live this life all according to what is pleasing to Him and in obedience to Him, glorying in the Creator and the Owner of the universe without whom I have no salvation. Beloved, the Lord's Day has meaning only in Jesus Christ. Apart from Him, one will only desire to delight in himself. to do your own will. But in Him, those who have been purchased by His blood, those who now belong to Him, not only in death, but also in this life too, they desire to do God's will. They desire to delight Him by striving to do what pleases Him. And you see, God's people will not busy themselves trying to justify doing this or that on the Lord's Day, but they will busy themselves by setting their minds to do only what pleases God, what points others to Him, and demonstrates that I am completely different than the world and its desires and its activities on His holy day. And just like with the other commandments, again, we cannot out-give God. Those who delight in the Lord's day by doing God's will will also delight in it, enjoying God's blessing in the second place. Very quickly. This day becomes a delight because the Lord's day leads us to God. Verse 14, Then you will find your joy in the Lord, and I will cause you to ride on the heights of the land and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob. The mouth of the Lord has spoken. For those in captivity, that pointed, of course, to the day that they would be returned, they hope, to the land flowing with milk and honey, the prosperity there, And ultimately, it points to spiritual blessing, spiritual prosperity. But you see, beloved, God promises greater pleasure in doing His will on His holy day than any pleasure that we might think that we will get doing our own will. Our will, when put in the place of God's will, only produces frustration. It produces discontentment. Verse 4, Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife and in striking each other with wicked fists. That's what selfishness produces. Contention. Strife. But God pours out His blessing in worship with His fellowship. We enjoy fellowship with Him. We meet Him in the confidence that He will speak to us and that He will hear us as we respond in faith. He pours out His blessing in worship as He promises to feed us with His Word by His Spirit. And through that to nourish and strengthen our faith and give us a greater assurance of salvation. He promises to teach us more and more to do His will. He pours out His blessing upon believers as we fellowship together. He strengthens us as brothers and sisters in Christ that together we might be bound in Christian love to worship Him together in a way that is pleasing to Him and to stand together arm and arm united against the world that hates Him. He pours out His blessing in our works of mercy. He gives joy, abundant joy, to those who give themselves humbly for others with the goal of pointing them to the only Savior, Jesus Christ. He pours out His blessing in our work as we labor in life the other six days. He will bless us with contentment. He will bless with contentment in work that is done as unto the Lord. He blesses with provision in this life which is sufficient whether you have little or whether you have much. He blesses with joy and satisfaction as we strive to live righteously in anticipation of that eternal rest to come. Beloved, He pours out His blessing upon you and me in life. The more pleasure and delight we take in serving God in a particular way on His holy day, the more pleasure we will find in it. That we might say with the psalmist in Psalm 73, verse 28, but as for me, it is good to be near God. Is that one of your mottos? Especially on the Lord's Day. But as for me, it is good to be near God. Oh, I suspect for many of us this is still difficult, isn't it? Because I still have my list. And the Bible just doesn't seem to answer all of our questions about how to spend the Lord's Day. Or does it? I believe it does. Our lives, including the Lord's Day, is to be determined, not by our own will and pleasure, which is often attracted to things that have no value. But our lives, including the Lord's Day, is to be determined by God's will, which alone is for our good, by what pleases Him. If you apply your questions to that, you will find an answer that is pleasing to God. And we must be careful, beloved. We must be careful because we often tend to determine right and wrong what we will do and won't do on the Lord's holy day by measuring it against the standard of what others do or don't do, Or based on what we have already determined to be proper or not, based on family traditions, things that we are already comfortable with, but all of those things are the wrong starting point. They're simply wrong. Instead, we are to base it on the standard of what is pleasing to God, not me. But our comfort, praise be to God, our comfort is that Jesus Christ is Lord even of the Sabbath. And He took on the death penalty for those who violated the Lord's holy day, including you and including me. He took that death penalty upon Himself so that we who violated God's will in favor of our own, believe it or not, we now have peace with God. And now we are citizens of heaven who look forward to that eternal rest foreshadowed by the Lord's day. But until that day, until that day, beloved, but we are called to be vigilant. We are not to be content. We are not to become complacent. We are not to be comfortable with how we spend the Lord's Day. Not from now until the day we die. Instead, we are called to show gratitude to God, striving more and more in continuous examination of our observance of the Lord's Day. We are to pray for the leading of the Holy Spirit and constantly reform our practices to what delights God. Constantly reform our practices that we too then may delight in the Lord's Day as through it He draws us closer to Himself. Brothers and sisters in Christ, may our Lord's Day motto be, to God alone be the glory. Great things He has done. Let's bow together in prayer. Heavenly Father, indeed we pray that Your Holy Spirit will speak to our hearts. We thank You, O Lord, that we are not saved by keeping Your commandments because the truth is not one of us has. We have broken every single one of them in word, in thought, in deed, every day of our life, so that we are guilty. We thank You, Lord, that You have sent Your Son as a far greater gift than even the Sabbath, who endured the agonies of the cross, who endured hell itself, where there is no rest everlastingly. He endured all this for us, that there might be a Sabbath rest remaining to the children of God, and that we may one day enter into it freely, undeservedly, by Your grace, as the very opposite of what we have earned. Father, we praise You that what we deserve, You have taken through Your Son on the cross. That we might receive what we do not deserve, the free gift of eternal life. For trusting, receiving Jesus Christ. In His blessed name we pray these things. Amen.